pandemona
47 ( +1 | -1 )"Deux foux gagnes toujours; trois foux, non!" ~ Alekhine, when watching a game between amateurs when the loser angrily proclaimed something similar to, "I had the bishop pair! I should have won!". I understand it was a play on words in that 'foux' can mean either 'bishop' or 'fool'. He's saying: "Two bishops/fools win the game... three bishops/fools, no!"

anaxagoras
38 ( +1 | -1 )that's because "foux" means crazy, and the bishops were sometimes likened to court jesters or "crazies" (in the not so distant past) because the king and queen stand between them.

does anyone have the exact quote where Steinitz claimed to have played a game of chess with God over the telephone? (btw, he also claimed to have won!)

nima_tal
32 ( +1 | -1 )Tactics is knowing what to do when there is something to do; strategy is knowing what to do when there is nothing to do -Tartakower and I also like this one: The chessboard is the world, the pieces are the phenomena of the Universe, the rules of the game are what we call the laws of Nature and the player on the other side is hidden from us

"Chess is the art which expresses the science of logic" (Mikhail Botvinnik)

"There are two types of sacrifices: correct ones and mine" (Mikhail Tal)

"A Chess game is divided into three stages: the first, when you hope you have the advantage, the second when you believe you have an advantage, and the third... when you know you're going to lose!" (Savielly Tartakower)

calmrolfe
17 ( +1 | -1 )Hmm...I've all too often felt an affinity with Nimzovitch, who once famously yelled at the top of his voice whilst in the Tournament Hall "THAT I SHOULD LOSE TO THIS IDIOT !!!"

pandemona
46 ( +1 | -1 )Not such famous names...... but I can thoroughly identify with these quotes.

"Whenever you have to make a rook move and both rooks are available for said move- you should evaluate which rook to move and, once you have made up your mind... MOVE THE OTHER ONE!!!" ~Oscar Panno

"Having calculated a long variation, go for it, even you are not completely sure. Out of two sins - overestimation and underestimation of your own capacities, the latter is more dangerous." ~ Svetlana Matveeva

The quote above should be attributed to nimzovich: "Why must I lose to this idiot?" (Aron Nimzovich)

tulkos
11 ( +1 | -1 )O, and one more:"Chess is a part of culture and if a culture is declining then Chess too will decline" (Mikhail Botvinnik)

tyekanyk
61 ( +1 | -1 )I got a pretty long one..."Education in chess has to be an education in independent thinking and judging. Chess must not be memorised, simply because it is not important enough...Memory is to valuable to be stocked with trifles. Of my fifty-seven years I have applied at least thirty to forgetting most of what I had learned or read, and since I succeeded in this I acquired a certain ease and cheer which I should never again like to be without. You should keep in mind no names, nor numbers, nor isolated incidents, not even results, but only methods.The method is plastic. It is applicable in every situation." Emanuel Lasker